1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to cooking devices. In particular, the present invention relates to cooking devices that can be used to separate and remove fat from foods cooked in a crock pot and the like.
2. Description of the Related Art
For many years, doctors and researchers in medicine, professionals in cooking, therapists for fitness and well-being, and vocal persons and writers in the media have directed attention to excessive consumption of fat. Cholesterol contained in fat, particularly animal fat, contributes to vascular disease. Moreover, excessive consumption of fat increases body weight and often leads to obesity.
Beef fat typically contains more undesirable cholesterol than fish, pork or poultry. Some people have purchased less beef in an attempt to consume less cholesterol, a marketing trend that has been a detriment to the beef industry.
There has been little technology developed for separating good fat from bad fat during cooking. Doctors encourage patients to eat less fat to avoid too much cholesterol. Meat processors add poultry meat to beef to reduce cholesterol, then claim reduced "fat" content in the final product. However, to effectively reduce bad fat in beef consumption, both the good fat and the bad fat should be removed during processing and cooking. The bad fat can then be extracted by mechanical means (e.g., centrifugal or filtration) or a refinery process (e.g., chemicals and heat) to separate bad fat from the good.
A crockpot is a popular piece of cookware that provides slow cooking of foods using water and steam. Water is heated on the bottom of the crockpot, steam from the heated water cooks ingredients as it rises to the lid, then condenses into droplets that baste foods as they fall back to the bottom of the crockpot. This cycle of steam generation continues until cooking of the food is completed.
The use of steam cooking devices has grown in popularity in recent years due to a perception that foods cooked in steamers tend to maintain their nutrients and have less added fat as compared to fried foods and the like. However, there is a need in the cooking industry for improved cooking devices that separate fat from foods being slowcooked in a crockpot or the like using water and steam.